Tomorrow the welfare reform bill returns to the House of Commons. There were a few modest amendments won in the House of Lords – the government is threatening to overturn them all, using financial privilege as its method.
I could go into a long and impassioned blogpost about how I perceive the rights and wrongs of this, blind you with arithmetic as the government is doing, but I think what is needed is quick bullet points and even quicker action.
What’s on the line:
They’ve time limited financial support for ppl with cancer. That’s something that could happen to any of us. And the new proposals imply that you wouldn’t be able to apply for some benefits until 6 months after your illness begins. Macmillan responded on this a year ago, as far as I can tell the government didn’t listen. So you could be having chemo and receive no support after being assessed fit for work. Sound OK?
The same time limiting applies to ppl with mental health issues. The government allowed a year. Lords pushed it up to two, but government are threatening to reduce it back again. This is another thing that can happen in any family. Will you support Mind?
That benefits cap. The government hasn’t compared like with like – the average salary that they’ve quoted could attract some of the very benefits that they are trying to cap. And as for saying that removing child benefit from the cap would push the benefits received up to 50,000 – well, you’d need 34 children to achieve that. Good luck with that, you world record breakers, you! And the cap is addressing a problem that doesn’t really exist – it isn’t the ppl on benefits that receive a huge slice of that money, it’s landlords charging exorbitant rents. Sound fair to you? Read around on it.
Disability living allowance. The budget is being cut by 20% on an in work benefit that currently has a fraud rate of 0.5%. So at the moment we deem those ppl disabled enough to require assistance – somehow they are becoming less disabled? I doubt it. It needs more careful consideration, and the government is just steam rollering these changes through. It could be any of us tomorrow – all it takes is an accident.
Take Action:
If any of these issues spur you on to take action, there are a couple of quick and easy things you can do.
You can sign @patspetition it needs 100,000 signatures for them to take notice. That’s not a lot, and it’s at 27000 already. But can we reach the target in a day? That’s more of a challenge, but I believe it’s doable. Ppl signed to get Hester to give up his bonus, didn’t they?
Email your MP to support the Lords Amendments. You can use Write to them or the form on Suey2y‘s blog.
Tweet in support of #spartacusreport and @patspetition Raise awareness, spread the word.
Want more information before you decide what to do? There’s a huge number of blogposts out there about all this. Some are here on LoveAllBlogs. You could google #spartacusreport and see what else you turn up – there’s huge amounts of material, personal stories out there on blogs.
Please, please, don’t let this moment pass. Please take action.
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